One of my Fair entries was a lap quilt I made for my Mom. I was so excited when she moved into a new apartment earlier this year. I never expected her to consider it: she's 81. Most friends, when I told them, were surprised too: their parents were moving out of apartments and into assisted living facilities or in with their children. Mom took on the move with such energy, it was inspiring. I needed to do something to mark this occasion, so I did what I usually do: I made a quilt. We helped Mom with everything, my brother & sister-in-law, my sister, my husband and I, including buying new furniture. My sister-in-law and I spent a full day at furniture stores looking through thousands of fabrics and created fabric groups for Mom to review. That way, she wouldn't be exhausted from all the running around and could enjoy choosing the look of her new living room. And if she didn't see anything she liked, we would go back and look for more. I laid out the fabric groupings on the carpet, and Mom had the fun of 'designing' her living room furniture by picking and choosing. And did she had fun! Rearranging groups... moving fabrics around to see them in & out of the light... we tried every combination enjoying it and coffee and conversation. Mom chose a beautiful combination of blues and browns (Fig 1). We ordered the furniture and 8 weeks later it arrived. And in the mean time, I got busy on her quilt.

Fig 2

I decided to use a collection of Civil War Reproduction fabrics I'd bought years earlier, all blues and browns, but only a fat quarter of each (Fig 2). And the patterns were all small and medium and the value range was limited, but I could make it work. My quilt design could be a single patch, or a log cabin variation, or some simple repeated pattern. I browsed my quilting magazine collection and looked around online for ideas. I saw several Modern designs that started with a classic block and cut it into pieces. Most were limited in fabric number or depended on a wider value range than my fabrics. And looked very busy. This quilt would be busy enough using all those fabrics and I wanted a cleaner look. I started sketching some ideas and realized I needed to add more fabrics to make those ideas work. But not if I simplified. I went back to my original idea of a single patch block and sketched some more. I decided on a 9-patch block with cuts through each outside patch. I would still have to add fabric because I didn't have enough of any single fabric to complete this idea. Then it hit me: a single cut using a single fabric would give me the clean look I wanted. Like sashing on the inside of the patch! That was it--so I sat down with a notebook and calculated all the yardage, sizes and number of patches I would need.

I'm getting my entries together to deliver to the fairgrounds this week. It's Ohio's Oldest Agricultural County Fair: The Great Geauga County Fair! Since 1823, people having been coming together at the Fair to show what they have accomplished that year, what they've grown, raised, crafted and assembled. The first time I entered anything, I received a Red Ribbon for a cross stitch piece. It was entered in the category, "Unframed." Actually, it was unfinished because I did not have time to add all the beadwork and frame it, so I was really proud with getting a second-place for what I considered 'un-done.' And it gave me a push to do more the following year. This year, I'm entering a patchwork pillow, a bed quilt, a lap quilt and a 3-panel wall hanging art quilt, some baked goods, jelly, plants and flowers from my garden. I intended to enter some veg, but the rain and cooler weather played havoc with them and nothing was ripe this week. Having entries in the Fair makes me a part of it, and I really enjoy that: I am part of its very long tradition. There's so much history, so many people involved each year for 192 years... it connects me to them. And I like that connection.

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I design quilts, think about quilts, and quilted things, making them myself and hopefully, through this Blog, sharing my creative designs and discoveries with you.